Klarinet Archive - Posting 000436.txt from 2002/03

From: Neil Leupold <leupold_1@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Julian Bliss TV prog.
Date: Mon, 18 Mar 2002 07:15:27 -0500

Sounds highly engaging. Is anybody taping it?

~ Neil

--- Tony Wakefield <tony-wakefield@-----.net> wrote:
> All clarinet prodigies,
> I watched the first part of Julian Bliss` documentary TV prog. I`m not quite
> sure whether part 2 is also about him next week. But an interim report is
> here as I see it.
> He`s OK, and he`s having a wonderful time in school in the mornings`, and
> then off to the University for afternoon and evening sessions with Howard
> Klug, sometimes, we were told, till 10.00 pm. He`s 12 years old, and he
> seems to be coping very well indeed. Klug has a way with him, (on camera
> anyway) which puts the boy immediately at ease, both in his clarinet
> studies, and as part-time parent, losing in a game of Battleships in one
> scene. Bliss played his pieces in his performances (for a grading which I
> don`t know - American I would think) almost as tho` he was thinking of
> something entirely different - another game with Klug? Klug was sitting at
> the back of the room looking quite relaxed, as tho` he knew that Julian
> wouldn`t slip up. We were informed that Julian would not be given any
> benefits due to his immature years, albeit mature talent. I think (it wasn`t
> too clear on screen) Julian had memorised all his recital works. An moving
> arpeggio up to double high C was secure, if a little wobbly. At present, he
> still uses a clarinet sling. He has been at Indiana State uni. for about 12
> months now, and what cause some considerable sadness for me, was that his
> education in America has split the family into two. It most definitely
> showed, in interviews with Julian`s brother, living back home in UK with his
> father, (who is carrying on with his motor bike business), and even more so
> with Julian`s mother, who, to me, on camera looked and talked almost
> suicidally, relating how much she misses the UK and her family. With Julian
> away for most of the day, she is struggling to find a way of life she can
> relate to, to bring her some happiness, in the quest to educate Julian as he
> would want.
> A reason why Julian has been taken to America, related by an English horn
> professor who is also a family friend, throws some disgrace onto the British
> teaching profession. When searching for appropriate higher grade tutors, the
> family were confronted with teachers who did not want to teach "precosious
> children".
> This attitude, if true, does not hold out much hope for the future of
> British kids wanting to admire the British music education system, and I
> would say that it warrants some investigation.
> Like some sports personalities, it could be that Julian will be educated in
> US for his entire youth, and maybe eventually taking up US citizenship, his
> hand on his heart when speaking the daily allegience to the US in school,
> not causing him any homesickness for his mother country. Unlike his mother,
> in many ways, there remains a great dilemma in the family heirarchy, almost
> to the extent that (from what I observed) his parents might have wished to
> some degree that he didn`t have this amount of talent.
> There maybe more next week - I`m not quite sure yet.
> Tony W.
>
>
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